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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
If Canada axed its carbon tax– and rebates- this is how different households would gain or lose.
High-income households would tend to be the biggest winners, lower-income households hurt the most
Cutting/deferring carbon taxes is such a bad idea. It sends the wrong message. There should be no exemptions. This is the cost per tonne of carbon. Period.
If there is a segment of the population who suffer disproportionately due to the tax, you compensate them by providing a larger share of the rebates. This already happens with rural residents who have higher costs and fewer options in terms of transportation.
Now let’s say you lived down east and took out a loan to replace your oil furnace with a heat pump. You figured an increase in the rebate that would come with the promised carbon tax hike would help you pay it down. But then they decide to defer the tax (and therefore the rebate) instead. It’s a betrayal.
What Trudeau did is fundamentally against why the Carbon tax is considered to be one best means to reduce carbon emissions. And to top it off he did it for one of the worst heating fuels.
This tax has been praised as “a far better way to control pollution than the present method of specific regulation.”[66] It has also been lauded for its market based simplicity. This includes a description as “the most efficient way to guide the decisions of producers and consumers”